I know it's been forever since I've updated. Literally forever. But. this story has not been forgotten! And I promise that I will finish this story, no matter how long it takes, no matter what it takes! :D *end motivational speech to self
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot and all original characters.
Rain fell from thick heavy clouds, splattered onto the rooftops, boughs of trees, wet pavement. The water drops collected into a stream and flowed down gutters. If you listened closely, you would notice that the noise of the rainfall sounded like tears, softly pattering against homes and making little splashes in the puddles on the road. The tears fell heavily onto the brown leaves that littered the street and weighed down the old tree boughs in forest.
Now you focus your gaze onto a particular street. This street has little to distinguish it from the others in the small town in the middle of nowhere. Perhaps it was slightly narrower than the average street. Perhaps it ended just too abruptly before becoming the territory of a slightly overgrown forest. And perhaps this particular forest had roots that were slightly more rebellious than the norm. Old roots pushed and pulled and marred the concrete. The respectable residents on that street agreed that something had to be done about the trees. But on this night, the small box like homes on the perfectly ordinary street were quiet, save the occasional muted chatter of voices around the dinner table. The yellow light of the streetlamps showed no automobiles or pedestrians and the steadily increasing rainfall further ensured that none would appear. All was quiet save for the ever present sound of rain and moan of the wind.
The serene, almost tranquil sound of the elements was disrupted by a commotion in the third to last home on the street. The house was slightly older than most on the street and although the garden was well tended, marks of dilapidation were beginning to show on the house itself. Subtly peeling paint on the shutters and door. Moss on the rooftops. However, it was not the appearance of the house that attracted your attention. No, it was the nature of the inhabitants within. And it is here where our story begins.
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Rose held her breath as she opened the door of her home slowly. Her eyes surveyed the road outside but her ears were focused on the loud snoring within the drawing room. As soon as she ascertained the constant rhythm of her father's breaths, she opened the door wider, just enough for her to slip out onto the porch. Her foot touched the wooden floor and she heard a loud creak that cut through the noise of the rain.
Rose could barely muffle the gasp that came out of her own mouth as she stood frozen, one leg in and one leg out of the home. Her palms became wet with sweat. The snoring stopped and she heard movement on the couch that her father was sleeping on. Several endless seconds ticked on and Rose heard her own heart beat so loudly that she swore it would rouse her father more. But then the snoring resumed and Rose sensed no more movement from the couch.
She waited for a few more seconds and it hurt, it hurt so much to just be standing there, like a sitting duck waiting to make sure that her father was indeed asleep. Rose remembered the last time where she had been so close to freedom until he had crept up on her and his meaty hand had grabbed her arm and twisted and she had screamed.
Her heart drummed in her ears as she cautiously brought her second foot to join her first on the porch. Her shoulders sagged with relief when the porch did not creak. She began to push the door close but just as it had almost touched the door frame, the door gave another agonizingly loud creak and Rose knew, she just knew that her father was awake now.
She heard the couch shift and a loud yawn from its single occupant.
"Rooooosey, where arrrreee yooooouuu?"
His voice was drowsy and rasped and grated in her ears but Rose knew that he was just mocking her. He had probably woken at the first creak and had lain there. He must of been curious to see just how far she would go before fear took over. Before Rose's fear of her father took over and she ran back into the house. Back into the house to await her father's loving, tender embrace.
She let go of the door knob and ran. The horribly elongated syllables of her father's call echoed in her ears. Rose had never moved her legs so fast as she sprinted across the horribly large lawn that she remembered gardening with the hot sun on her back until her fingers were shredded and bleeding.
Rose's thoughts were singular, imbued with only fear and the desire to run. Her shoes found the road and made large splashes in the puddles. Rose could imagine her father behind her, large and lumbering with twitching fingers and dirty fingernails that were reaching, always reaching towards her, trying to catch her and put her back in that house. Rose felt, or imagined the panting, stinking alcohol tainted breathes on her neck. She felt, or imagined the brush of fingers on her spine, her shoulder blade, her shoulder. She felt, or imagined sticky fingers caressing her face, the line of her cheekbone, the length of her waist as she slept...
Rose ran as fast as a six year old could. She sprinted into the reaches of the forest across the road, where branches slapped her and etched cuts in the delicate surface of her pale skin. She heard the squishing of her shoes and the thumping behind her. Her father called out to her.
"Rosey, my love, my dear rose, come back, come back here this instant!"
Her lungs began to burn. Rose had never made it far enough to run for this amount of time. The rain poured down faster, obscuring her vision. She tasted the metallic tang of blood from the cuts on her face. All she could hear were the footsteps pounding behind her and her heartbeat tapping out a frantic, erratic rhythm. The forest grew dark and the trees that grew close together at first, grew closer. The land began to slope down and it became harder and harder to keep her footing against the wet forest floor. Rose pushed branches out her face, blinked water out of her eyes and ran and ran and-
-Tripped.
It must have been too dark. Rose did not see the large tree root in front of her and was flung off her feet. She tumbled down the steep slope of the forest and the world whirled before her eyes. Trees, rocks and whatnot collided with her face, arms, head and torso. Her long hair snagged against branches and twigs and was ripped out.
Rose slammed into something hard and her tumble was abruptly stopped. Her head ached and she tasted something metallic. A horrible ringing filled her ears. She opened her eyes but her vision was too blurry to see. She didn't known up from down, left from right. When she tried to breathe, she heard a wet gurgling sound and felt a sharp burst of pain. It hurt. Everything hurt. For a moment in time, all Rose could hear was the merciless tapping of the rain.
No, not all.
Rose could dimly hear the thudding footsteps as her father drew near. Through her blurry vision, she saw her father crouch down in front of her. She heard his even breaths. He didn't even seem like he was tired. Rose felt his rough, wet hand caress her face, smelled the alcohol on his breath. Rose was scared. She had failed, again, and now her father was never going to let her out of his sight. She shut her eyes tightly and trembled.
"Oh, my dear, dear Rose. What a bad little girl you've been today."
Her father laughed slightly and tears joined the rain on Rose's face.
"Do you remember what happened last time you were a bad little girl? Do you remember what I told you? What about what I did, Rosey? Do you remember that?"
He didn't wait for Rose to respond and took out a pocketknife. He reached out and ignored it when Rose cringed away from him into the tree she was crumpled against.. Her father took hold of one of her hands and used his knife to cut through the wet material of her shirt to reveal her forearm. He traced the scarring there with his finger and Rose could veritably hear his smile.
"Do you remember how much it hurt?"
Rose began to cry, great hiccuping sobs that penetrated through the sound of the rain. Fear, pain, the sound of rain and the stink of alcohol. All of it washed over her in a merciless tide and Rose hated it all. She hated being so weak, alway cowering in her father's presence, always running away. She hated her father for hurting her, for carving those words into her forearm, for watching her constantly, for those touches when he thought she was sleeping or when she wasn't paying attention. Rose hated her mother most of all, for leaving her to suffer and cry and wail in the hands of her father. She wanted to make them both hurt. Why was she crying? That was weak. If Rose wanted to hate them, she needed to show strength, courage. She pressed her lips together to prevent any more sobbing from escaping her mouth.
Rose opened her eyes and tried to lift herself off the floor so she could do something, anything to hurt her father. But the onslaught of pain from her chest stopped her. Her vision fuzzed even more and flickered, Her head pounded. She felt a sharp sting across her face.
Her father had let go of her arm and slapped her. Rose could sense that his face had turned red and ugly, even through her blurred vision. His face always turned red and ugly before her hurt her but never when he was hurting her. When her was hurting her, her father always smiled, cooed at her, stroked her face. Called her his darling little girl. He always told her to cry for him.
"I know what you're thinking. Such an ungrateful child, wanting to hurt her father. But that honor should only go to me. I am the only one allowed to touch you, make you smile, cry, scream. I think I treat you too well sometimes, Rose. Perhaps I should give you some more markings on top of what I had planned today. Perhaps I should decorate your face so everytime you look in the mirror, you'll be reminded not to disobey me".
Rose's father laughed and grasped her arm again, thumb roughly tracing over the scars. His red face and anger had vanished. His grip tightened and he flipped the knife open, resting the tip of the knife beside the cutting he had inflicted on her in the past. He spoke again, his voice calm and sugar sweet, like the quiet before the storm.
"You can scream all you like, Rosey. You ran so far in the forest no one could ever hear us. And what a lucky coincidence, the rain will wash all the blood away. And my dear Rose, you known all of this is for your own good, don't you?"
He smiled at her expectantly and Rose knew he wanted her to respond. Her mouth parted slightly but she couldn't get words to leave her mouth. Her body was on fire, she could hardly breath. Fear clouded her thoughts. What was he going to do to her?
"Rose, dear, you know better than to keep so quiet when your father is asking you a question. How disrespectful. You know this is all for your own good, don't you?"
Rose clenched her hands into fists as she trembled. Her father smiled.
"Yes.", she breathed.
"Yes what?"
"Yes father"
"Good little girl." He leaned down and pressed a kiss on her scratched cheek. Rose wished that she could reach up and strangle him with her bare hands. She wished that she could take that knife from him and hurt him, cut him into tiny tiny pieces, starting with his face. Rose saw him straighten and position his knife on her forearm. He met her gaze and smiled at her before turning him gaze back to the knife.
Rose tensed as she felt the first cut, the first sting that was only exacerbated by the constant rain falling on her skin. She pressed her lips together harder to suppress the desire to bed, to plead with her father to stop it. She wouldn't scream for him, she'd never scream for him. He was not her father. He was nothing. She wanted to rip him apart. Rose wanted to make him hurt. Rose felt the knife dig in deeper and make its journey carving out the let -
She would not scream.
She would not scream.
Rose felt the knife curve up, cutting through skin, muscle, ner -
She wonld not scream.
she would not scream
she would no- scream
she would n- scream
She would -
no
No
NO
Rose screamed. The scream gurgled, tearing through her throat and burning, like her father was cutting her throat instead of her arm. And the pain went on and on and on. Seconds bleed into minutes as she could feel every quiver of the knife, every tremble, every letter that he carved into her, declaring her his. Through distorted hearing, Rose could discern the calm voice of her father listing the tender epithets he had named her, declarations of how much he loved her and how much he was helping her. She was his Rose, his to hurt, his to kiss, his to love, his to control. Minutes bled into hours and Rose had no concept of time. Two things dominated her mind, the pain and the desire for the pain to stop.
And then it stopped.
Rose stopped screaming. The pain of the knife had stopped. No, the cuts still burned but the knife was gone. Also gone was the stench of her father's breath so near her face. Gone were his mad words, the pain that had been the core of her existence.. Her breathing was ragged, her throat burned. Her arm felt like it had been cut off and sewn back together. But her father was gone. As horrible as he was, he had shielded her from the wind. Now the elements bit into her skin like a thousand small knives. Rose opened her eyes to find her father absent. The rain had stopped as well. Besides the dripping of water, the forest was deafeningly quiet. A sharp snap of a twig jerked her blurry mind into awareness.
Rose casted her eyes around, her body tensed. She could only see the trees above her. Rose blinked again, trying to clear her vision. She had thought that she had seen... She tried again to lift herself up from her supine position but her efforts were again dogged by waves of pain. Her father was playing tricks on her. He was hiding behind a tree, ready to leap out and slash her again, cut her again, hurt her again. Any moment now, her father would appear, laughing, waving the knife, covered in her blood, taunting his dear sweet little Rosey.
A drop of heavy, warm liquid fell on her face. Then another. And then another. The drops rolled down her face and into her mouth where she tasted salty metallic liquid. Blood.
Rose raised one of her arms, teeth clenched against the pain, and rubbed her eyes, frantically trying to clear her blurred vision. Her body protested at the movement, at any movement at all. She blinked again and saw something far above her, swaying. Two things were swaying gently above her. Her eyes followed their motion, back and forth. Drops of blood fell from the two objects onto her face, rolling into her mouth.
Suddenly, Rose felt something wrap around her middle, just below her arms, and lift her up. A new wave of pain threatened to overwhelm her. Rose saw black spots. Her breathing became more labored and her chest felt tight and extended spikes of pain throughout her body. Rose felt herself being lifted into the trees. Higher and higher. Then she saw her father. Or, what was left of him.
Her father had been vertically bisected into two pieces. The cut was perfectly straight, like someone had used a very very sharp knife. Were someone to join the two halves together, it wouldn't even have looked like he was cut apart. Rose examined her father's face with unsettling calmness. She should have been terrified. Whatever had happened to her father would most likely happen to her as well. But her mind was calm and instead of the fear that had been here constant companion tonight and throughout her entire life, she felt relief instead. Her father was dead and he would never ever hurt her again.
The two halves of his face wore different expressions. One eye was closed while the other was wide open and looking directly at her. Both halves of his face shared the same frightened, pain filled expression. Rose ran her eyes over his body from top to bottom. A coil of something black was holding both halves of his body up but she ignored it, instead choosing to focus on the nature of her father's remains. She saw the knife he held, even in death, fingers wrapped tightly around the handle. She saw the source of the blood dripping onto her face. Blood rolled down each half of his body and collected at the soles of his feet before falling onto the forest floor far, far below onto where her face had once been. Before falling into her mouth. And how sweet it has tasted.
It became harder and harder to breath and Rose began to see dark spots in her vision. Her father's corpse was reduced to two vague dark blurs whose most notable features were the swinging. Her father's body swayed like the bell of a grandfather clock. Both pieces swayed in the same direction, at the same frequency. Her eyes followed the motion, mesmerized. Back forth back forth accompanied by the drip drip drip of his blood on the forest floor.
Rose blinked and focused on her father's face again, at the single open eye. It looked like he was giving Rose an extended wink. Had her father suddenly developed a sense of humor maybe he was going to tell her a joke before he killed her. But he was already dead. Rose found this incredibly funny, delightfully funny. How would he kill her now how would he hurt her now how would he touch her now he was dead. Blood spilled out of his nostrils. Out of his mouth. Out of his eyes, his skin. Like a water fountain. A blood fountain. She could freeze the blood and make a blood popsicle a blood pool a bloodbath she smelled she needed a bath and she would take a bath in her father's blood blood blood blood.
The coils of black holding her father lifted the pieces up and she followed them with her gaze. Now, both parts of the body were swinging at different frequencies. Rose couldn't decide which side of his body to follow. Her gaze stopped as she saw a man's head. He had no face, no eyes, no mouth, no nose. But Rose could feel him looking at her. She could feel him smile. She smiled back. And her eyes closed.